Archive for the ‘Cards’ Category

One of my hobbies is creating and playing with Magic: the Gathering decks. It’s an interesting game, with a lot of strategy and depth to it. The process of deck creation is a bit like character generation in an RPG, in that you put together pre-existing pieces into a coherent whole, and use that construction in competitive situations as your ‘weapon’.

This deck is one of my favorites. It’s for the format known as Elder Dragon Highlander. The rules (both stated and informal) of this format dictate that your deck is based around a single character who serves as your general, and 99 other cards which support your general. Unlike most games of Magic, you can be sure that you’ll be able to play your general every game, due to special rules of the format.

The general for this deck is Razia, an archangel who excels at attacking immediately after she enters the game, often catching an opponent off guard.

In order to maximize her effectiveness, the deck uses a variety of tricks to ensure that one swing from Razia can cause a massive amount of damage. Lethal damage in this format is 21 points, and her power is only 6 – meaning that she will need some help if she’s to kill in only 1 or 2 swings.

These cards help by increasing the damage she deals, either by adding a few points, doubling her damage for the turn, or allowing extraattacks in the same turn. In a large game, catching an opponent off guard with several of these effects at once can be a very effective killing tool.